Prostate-cancer patients travel for Charlotte company’s cure

By Greg Lacour
The company is in Charlotte, its device has been used on more than 7,000 prostate-cancer patients, and the treatment is billed as creating few side-effects, but there is a catch.
To take advantage of US HIFU’s Sonablate 500 procedure, patients have to leave the country.
For now, anyway.
For six years, Charlotte-based US HIFU has distributed the Sonablate 500 device, which is approved for use in more than 30 countries worldwide.
The company learned in April that it had taken a critical step toward its goal of selling the device stateside.
An independent board of experts cleared the way for US HIFU to continue clinical trials of the Sonablate 500, a machine that uses ultrasound waves to generate high heat and kill malignant cells in the prostate.